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Il fut un temps, où un président d'Haïti, démocratiquement élu fit entendre
sa voix pour réclamer, non pas des dédommagements par rapport à l'esclavage,
mais l'argent qui avait été extorqué à la première République Noire au monde
en échange de sa reconnaissance internationale et de la fin du boycott
économique auquel elle était soumise et qui, bien évidemment, l'empêchait de se développer;
Mal lui en prit. Une campagne de démonisation déferla sur lui
et bon nombre de ses partisans furent tués.Une coalition faite d'étrangers
et de locaux totalement réactionnaires, l'envoya promptement en Afrique et,
en échange, envoya des troupes de l'ONU dans le pays, afin de discipliner
la population haïtienne et lui rappeler qui était aux commandes.
La suite on la connaît : répression des masses, choléra et cerise sur le gâteau, élections fantasmagoriques et sélection de l'actuel président.
Que des gens de l'extrême-droite aient été partie prenante de ce plan,
c'est tout à fait normal et logique. Mais, que des écervelés se prétendant
progressistes, nous aient foutu dans ce trou sans fond,
un tel égoïsme, une telle vision à court terme, une telle absence
de compréhension des enjeux politiques nationaux et internationaux,
ça c'est impardonnable après 200 d'une histoire de relations empreintes de conflits
liés à la souveraineté du pays avec les anciens colonisateurs et les USA.
C'est assez amusant de voir une décennie plus tard, les pays
de la Caricom s'engager dans une action en justice contre les anciens colonisateurs.
Slavery compensation: Caribbean nations propose Mau Mau model
Regional organisation targets British, French and Dutch governments over continuing effects of slavery
- Associated Press in Miami
- guardian.co.uk, Thursday 25 July 2013 20.51 EDT
An 1833 illustration of former slaves in Barbados celebrating the passing
of the emancipation law. Photograph: Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Leaders of more than a dozen Caribbean countries are launching a united
effort to seek compensation from three European nations for what they say
is the lingering legacy of the Atlantic slave trade.
The Caribbean Community, a regional organisation, has taken up the cause
of compensation for slavery and the genocide of native peoples and
is preparing for what would likely be a drawn-out battle with the
governments of Britain, France and theNetherlands.
It has engaged the British law firm of Leigh Day,
which waged a successful fight for compensation for hundreds of Kenyans
who were tortured by the British colonial government during
the so-called Mau Mau rebellion of the 1950s and 1960s.
Lawyer Martyn Day said his first step would probably be to seek
a negotiated settlement with the governments of France, Britain and Netherlands
along the lines of the British agreement in June to issue a statement of regret
and award compensation of £19.9m to the surviving Kenyans.
"I think they would undoubtedly want to try and see if this
can be resolved amicably," Day said of the Caribbean countries.
"But I think the reason they have hired us is that they want to show
that they mean business."
Caricom is creating a reparations commission to press the issue,
said Ralph Gonsalves, the prime minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines,
who has been leading the effort.
The legacy of slavery includes widespread poverty and under-development,
Gonsalves said. Any settlement should include a formal apology,
but contrition alone would not be enough, he said.
"The apology is important but that is wholly insufficient," he said in a phone
interview on Wednesday. "We have to have appropriate recompense."
The notion of forcing the countries that benefited from slavery to pay
reparations has been a decades-long quest. Individual countries
including Jamaica and Antigua and Barbuda already have national commissions.
Earlier this month, leaders from the 14 Caricom nations voted unanimously
at a meeting in Trinidad to wage a joint campaign that those involved say
would be more ambitious than any previous effort.
Each nation that does not have a national reparations commission
agreed to set one up, sending a representative to the regional commission,
which would be overseen by prime ministers. They agreed to focus on
Britain on behalf of the English-speaking Caribbean, France
Caribbean officials have not mentioned a compensation figure but
Gonsalves and Verene Shepherd, chairwoman of the national reparations
commission in Jamaica, both noted that Britain at the time of emancipation
in 1834 paid £20m to British planters in the Caribbean, the equivalent of £200bn now.
"Our ancestors got nothing," Shepherd said. "They got their freedom and
they were told 'Go develop yourselves'."
The British high commissioner to Jamaica, David Fitton, said in a radio
interview on Wednesday the Mau Mau case was not meant to be a precedent
and that his government opposed reparations for slavery.
"We don't think the issue of reparations is the right way to address these issues,"
Fitton said. "It's not the right way to address an historical problem."
In 2007, marking the 200th anniversary of the British prohibition on
the transportation of slaves, then prime minister Tony Blair expressed regret
for the "unbearable suffering" caused by his country's role in slavery.
then French presidentNicolas Sarkozy was asked about reparations
for slavery and the 90m gold francs demanded by Napoleon to
recognise the country's independence. Sarkozy acknolwedged
the "wounds of colonisation" and pointed out that France
had cancelled a ¢56m debt to Paris and approved an aid package
that included ¢40m in budget support for the Haitian government.
Gonsalves said much more needed to be done and he hoped
to begin an "honest, sober and robust" discussion with the European
governments soon, championing the issue when he takes over as
chairman of Caricom in January.
"You have to seize the time," he said.
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